taxes -- texas, the home of presidents? let's play "hardball". good evening. chris matthews in washington. leading tonight, second look, it didn't include the reaction of rick perry to include some doubts. politico reports that republicans are getting skittish over perry. their message to perry, what

plays in texas may not play in peoria. check out this tweet that went out yesterday, quote, to be clear, i believe in evolution and trust scientists on global warming. call me crazy. nothing remarkable about that except it came from a republican presidential candidate, jon huntsman. how far right has the gop gone when it's crazy for a republican gop candidate to admit he believes in evolution. is there anything difference between the republican party and the tea party? still pining for hillary? some democrats are having second thoughts about voting for barack obama. to that, a former hillary supporter writes in hillary clinton, cool it. the day wouldn't be complete without an interesting oddity out of the head of michele

bachmann, would it? come on. now she's suggesting that we all fear a rise of the soviet union. she's worried about the soviet union. even though it died 20 years ago. let me finish tonight with the need for the president to -- this is my idea, big, do something big. we start with some gop doubts about rick perry. michael steele is the former chair of the republican national committee. he's always be our republican national committee chair. and now msnbc analyst, ron reagan is a political commentator. i want to show you some thoughts from governor perry. here he is going after president obama on jobs today in south carolina. he is hitting the circuit. let's listen. >> the real issue is the president is out there and he was on a jobs tour. this is the president of the united states that has killed more jobs in america than i think any president in the history certainly in my lifetime.

[ applause ] i think the only job he cares about is the one he's got. >> of course, the president came into office in the middle of a recession when the country's bleeding jobs, hemorrhaging jobs. take a look at this chart from the bureau of labor statistics tracking month to month job growth. since january of 2008 until last month. the job list slowed down. look at that chart, obama's been gaining jobs ever since halfway through 2009. the hemorrhaging of jobs was of course a carry as we walked into office. michael steele is it fair to say this president's caused our economic problems when he walked in during a hemorrhaging and took him six months to close the hemorrhage and create jobs and he's blamed for what bush did? >> absolutely. it's politics. it's on his watch. >> it's bs? >> you call it bs.

i'm sure republicans would call it something different and democrats would call it something different if the shoe were on the other foot. but the bottom line is this rick perry is talking to his audience. he's not talking to you. he's not talking to the elite here in washington. he's talking to folks in his base. i'm not disagreeing with you facts are facts. he's not talking to those facts. he's talking to how people feel, the job of unemployment is 9.2%. that's not reflected in the wonderful blue lines. the reality is if you've been unemployed since obama became president, seven months into his term, this is something that you're feeling right now. you don't think about what happened before bush. right now that's what he's speaking to. >> the party of lincoln is no longer the party of fact. how do you feel? are you going to ignore the numbers. michael just admitted that facts

don't matter. >> i didn't say that. >> what i'm saying is speaking to his base. i'm not ignoring the facts. you can talk about the facts of the context of what people are feeling right now. >> for his base, facts don't matter. >> ignore the facts. go on. ron, your thoughts about this. it is interesting if you look at those numbers. we do have a terrible economy right now. but if you look at hemorrhaging, this president -- it was like the titanic was sinking. he stopped it from sinking. he sealed off the cracks, but halfway through the first year in office he was creating jobs. creating net jobs. your thought, ron. >> indeed, but michael is right. the audience for rick perry doesn't care about facts. they do just care about how they feel at the moment. and they feel angry and they're focusing that feeling on president obama. who cares about the facts. who cares if the guy preceded him really lost those jobs. facts don't matter in the

republican party anymore. >> let's look at governor perry going after the president on another favorite topic, health care. let's watch what he said today and let's assess it. >> we know what it's going to do to the quality of health care. we know what it's going to do to the cost of health care. if i'm so fortunate to be elected president of the united states on day one, when i walk into the oval office, there will be an executive order on that desk that eliminates as much of obama care as i could have done with an executive order. >> this guy thinks the way to act like reagan is to wear a brown suit. >> oh, please. >> first of all this was created by statute, so he can't really get rid of it. go ahead. congress passed it.

>> there are some aspects of the regulatory side of it and maybe some other aspects of it that he can slow down the process. you're right, it's largely a statutory issue. just like what the president is talking about doing with immigration. the president is talking about buying executive order, make some changes in immigration law. to the extent that the executive pen will allow him to. >> do you think he can win this fight for the nomination of your party by trashing obama and ignoring his opponents? >> yes. it's a very smart move. he's had a very good week. he engaged the president. the president engaged back. at the end of it, he came out ahead. >> this relentless machine gun attack, his kind of relentless assault on the president seems to be what they want, ron, on the other side. they seem to want pugilism. they want punch, punch.

they feel romney won't do it, huntsman won't do it and the other candidates don't matter, i guess michelle does, but she doesn't do it. >> yes, they do want people to be tearing into him all the time. unfortunately the way perry does that sort of thing, like his comment about ben bernanke being treasono treasonous, the way he does it is going to turn people off. that stuff may fly in texas like wearing cowboy boots with your suit, but the rest of the country not so much. >> ron, you don't wear your cowboy boots with your suits? >> i wear my cowboy boots when i go riding a horse. that's what those are meant for. >> you wear the boot inside the pant or outside? coming up, why would it be considered crazy for a republican presidential candidate, jon hunts hahn, to

believe in evolution. i asked reince priebus about it when we return. you're watching "hardball" only on msnbc. ease of cooking is very important to me.

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welcome back to "hardball." rnc chairman reince priebus

the new head of the republican party taking a hard turn to the right, we think. welcome mr. chairman. >> thank you. >> let me ask you about this comment made by former utah governor jon huntsman yesterday. he tweeted quote, to be clear i believe in evolution and trust scientists on global warming. call me crazy. that's a sarcastic comment. is he odd man out on those issues in your party now? >> i don't know. i'm not doing a poll of all the candidates. this is what's going to happen. we have a rigorous debate. we've got as you've pointed out, we've got a lot of different folks in the field. i happen to believe, chris, that having a lot of candidates in the field, having a big primary is good for our party. it gets a lot of people out there. it gets a lot of earned media, a lot of tv time. a lot of print media. all the horsepower i think is on our side of the aisle right now. >> aren't you worried in a world where we have to compete with

science and science and technology with chinese and india and young geniuses and some move here and some in their countries around the world, we're competing in a world of science and technology. to be a country that might be led by somebody who doesn't believe in evolution and climate change and who doesn't believe in the scientific community of his own country. wouldn't that be scary to have somebody who was so anti-intellectual as president. >> come on. >> would it be? he's your party. >> here's what i think, i don't think the election's going to be decided on evolution. the election is going to be decided on a fundamental question that the american people are going to ask themselves and they're going to ask themselves whether or not they're better off today than they were three or four years ago. >> if that's the issue, you win. if it's just about conditions, but i'm asking you about the philosophy of who leads our country. philosophy is important. you guys are always talking about the philosophy of our president.

you call him a socialist. isn't it fair to ask about the philosophy of perry and bachmann. isn't that fair? >> i don't think it's unfair. but i can't sit here and tell you what the philosophy is of all 12 candidates and sit here with a give and take on each and every one. >> you call obama a socialist. you all do. >> wait a minute, people are going to -- i told you what they're going to ask themselves. then they're going to ask if this president has followed through on his promises. the president told the american people he would cut the deficit in half during the first time. he introduced the biggest structural deficit in america. but i think what we probably can disagree on a lot of things but what he can agree on is he's had a hard time exhibiting a little leadership. we may differ on what the answer might be. i think we both can agree that this president has a real hard time leading when our president -- when our country

and the people in this country are starving for real authentic people to lead the greatest country on the face of the earth in the times that are very difficult. this president has a hard time with that. >> do you have a hard time with the fact that your party left this country in wreckage with a hemorrhaging unemployment rate. there was booming unemployment. this president got in the bed when it was on fire. you don't point that out. you think you left this bed all made for him. everything was great when he walked in the door. we had a financial community going crazy. just say that to me. tell me he walked in the door to hell. just tell me that first. >> i don't think that that's any party or person blameless in any of this. >> you think he walked into a good situation you left him with? you're blaming him for everything and saying bush wasn't responsible. >> this president has a hard time following through on promises. he said the stimulus would create unemployment.

unemployment's been on a sustained range that we haven't seen in over 30 years, chris. >> i know. >> we flushed a trillion dollars down the toilet and americans are hurting. he said he cut the deficit in half. biggest structural deficit in the history of the world. said he tackled the debt. under the policies of barack obama. not before him, but on barack obama's policies he put us on a trajectory to accumulate more debt than every single president before him combined. >> yes, sorry the trouble is that the president came in before and doubled the national debt. never vetoed a single spending bill in eight years. isn't that a problem for your record? >> listen, the president's going to be judged on his record. his record right now is a catastrophe in regard to this economy. i think we know that. we've got a president who's whistling past the graveyard, chris. he's out in martha's vineyard while the rest of america is waiting in line for jobs. >> you've got all your points.

i think you've got them on the record now. let me ask you a question, a serious question. what's the difference between the republican party and the tea party? >> i think there's -- obviously we're an organized, structured party. the tea party is not. i think it's a group of people who are conservative, independent, people who are disengaged. i will say this, i think it's important to know -- >> what's the difference in philosophy? >> i don't know all the differences there's 100 different tea party groups. let me tell you something, where there's similarities is we need to get our spending under control. we need to get our debt under control. we need to respect the constitution. those are things that are near and dear to the republican party's heart. i'll also tell you that the republican party isn't in competition with the conservative movement. we're not competing. they're their own organization. their own entity. i'm grateful for it. it moved america in the right

direction. >> can you name a difference between the republican party and the tea party? >> we're a structured organization with a registered -- >> on policy. on policy. >> what do you mean on policy? >> new studies that tea party people believe there should be more religion in politics. they have a bad attitude towards race, toward immigrants. >> chris, that's the beauty of the tea party. you can't define who it is and what their beliefs are because they're not an organized entity. one tea party in rockford, illinois, could have a different view than a tea party up in milwaukee, wisconsin. the fundamental similarities are we want to get our country back on track, economically. we want to recognize that the government is making promises it can't keep and we need to get serious about the debt and deficit in this country.

these are important issues. >> let me ask you about your party. i agree with a lot of republicans. i grew up in the republican party. i completely understand -- >> what happened? >> i studied the issues. let me ask you about the fact of smaller government, less tax. they're popular ideas. i understand the appeal of those. for a long time donald trump was the leader in the polls because he challenged the president's legitimacy as an american. there is an appeal in your party to this birther stuff. the president had to show his papers to shut it down. what is it in your party that was so focused that you made donald trump the front runner because all he did was raise the birther issue. what happened there? you're an expert on politics. >> first of all, i didn't make donald trump the front runner. >> he was the leader in the polls. >> hang on a second, chris. i never one time questioned this issue. in fact, i threw it away. i'm not on record with that. our party's not on regard with that.

the fact of the matter is what americans are looking for in ar that. the fact of the matter is what americans are looking for ird w that. the fact of the matter is what americans are looking for icrd that. the fact of the matter is what americans are looking for in rd that. the fact of the matter is what americans are looking for icrd that. the fact of the matter is what americans are looking for iord that. the fact of the matter is what americans are looking for in this country and the reason why donal and sarah palin resonate with the american people is that american in this country are starving for real leadership. people with guts and a spine. this president hasn't been able to exhibit any of those things at all. >> do you believe that barack obama is a loyal, patriotic american. >> of course. >> thank you. chairman of the republican party. up next michele bachmann was once worried about anti-americanism in congress. now she's worried about the rise of the soviet union. yes, the soviet union. we'll talk about that in the side show. you're watching "hardball." ay t. so i took my heartburn pill and some antacids. we're having mexican tonight, so another pill then? unless we eat later, then pill later? if i get a snack now, pill now? skip the snack, pill later...

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back to "hardball." now for the side show. first up, it's on. that's what jon stewart had to say to standard & poor's last night on "the daily show." >> you mess with us, we mess with you. you may be subject to several depositions by government

officials. plus, interviews by investigators that in some cases could lead to fines. obviously, it's a negotiation in many respects. the point is there's a strong chance your name will end up in a scathing editorial in "the new york times." sorry s&p, but revenge is a dish best served slow and with a great deal of bureaucratic paperwork. >> it's clear who he thinks has the upper hand in this fight. another baffling history flub from gop candidate michele bachmann. this one coming as the foreign policy position of bachmann and her opponents start playing a role in the campaign trail. speaking on a christian radio program yesterday, bachmann had this to say on what the country has to fear in the world right now. >> what people recognize is that there's a fear that the united states is a an unstoppable decline. they see the rise of china, india, the rise of the soviet union and our loss militarily going forward. >> whoa.

when was the last time somebody expressed fear of the rise to have soviet union. how about two decades ago when it seized to exist. this happened during bachmann's stint at the irs. she said it was part of a plan to learn how they work so i can defeat them. maybe she was too busy with her secret plan to take notice of the end of the cold war. that's "hardball" for now. thanks for being with us. up next "your business" with j.j. ramburg. [ woman ] jogging stroller. you've been stuck in the garage while i took refuge from the pollen that made me sneeze. but with 24-hour zyrtec®, i get prescription strength relief

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